molls4

Good luck in your career, OP. With that work ethic, it's likely to shine in your work relationships. This was probably the best example of how NOT to be a team player in a patient's plan of care. No matter the department, we all work to get the patient better. There's a lot of stuff the ED could improve on, as with floor nurses. Everyone just needs to help one another, learn from experiences, and move on. Do a good job, give a good report, ship the patient off to the new nurse, and go to work on the new patients. That's your job. Take pride in the care you give and let it shine when you hand off to the next nurse (whatever the department). Perspective.

Amazon prime offers a free student trial- that translates into free two day shipping. All you need is a .edu email address. Their two day shipping has always been reliable for me.

I am a new grad too. Like above, I'm definitely not a hiring manager for a hospital, but I see the private duty peds or the home health jobs being the most beneficial in terms of beefing up your résumé and letting you polish your nursing skills. I agree with the poster above- You will be very limited in scope of practice as a tech. With both the private duty and home health, you'll see a variety of patients and learn more things that will help with floor nursing. If you want to go into peds, the private duty sounds like it would be a good résumé addition when you apply for more peds jobs. Also, who knows, maybe you'll love it and want to stay PRN still with it? You do get to know your clients and families really well, which could be very rewarding. The school nurse job could also be rewarding, but with community nursing, sometimes you're using a different skill set than floor nursing. But, a lot of people find that very rewarding. Plus, the schedule and benefits working at a school might be awesome (summers off possibly?). Good luck with your decision!

What do you use for your "brain" (patient assignment sheet) while you're at work? I know a lot of facilities have pre-printed "brains" that you can use, however, they're usually generic, have small places for pt info, and aren't organized how you would organize the info. I had a hard time following those generic patient assignment sheets and felt lost when I looked at it to figure out what task to do next. But, one of my preceptors had formulated her own brain sheet that was waaaayyyy better than the pre-printed one. It helped me organize my day and prioritize efficiently. I finally decided to piggy back off of her patient assignment sheet and personalize my own brain, too. I definitely feel like it helped!

I took this test recently, so I figured I would comment on what my study plan was. I used my Saunders NCLEX review book and reviewed some notes from class. I like Saunders a lot because of the organization of the material. But if you don't already own it, the ATI study guide should be fine. Although I didn't use the ATI study guide, I did do my ATI peds practice tests again. Good luck!

I haven't started yet, but I'm a recent BSN grad that is going to start the new grad program in a few weeks. I briefly met with the recruiters at a career fair last fall and they recommended a few things to me. First, if you can do your practicum there, that helps you get hired after graduation. Second, try to get a tech job while in school for experience (if you haven't already). It helps if you can get a job being a tech there. But, they told me that if you cannot get a tech job with them, just get experience somewhere. I wasn't able to get a tech job with them, but I did get one. I also did my practicum there. As far as my own advice for the new grad residency application, put general medical surgical as one of your choices (you get 3). That way, you can be considered for a bunch of departments. If you put all critical care choices you limit to only their departments. There are way more medical surgical floors, so it increases your chances of having your application reviewed by more departments. Hope this helps!

After polling my friends (some internal candidates), it appears that the departments that are hiring new grads are all at different points in the process. Some applicants are taking the peds test (last part of the process before an official offer is made) already. Some departments are still doing phone and in person interviews I think. I was told that some departments wait longer to see where their needs are, so that's why I believe some are still in the early stages. It sounds like there's still plenty of time, even if you applied super early :-) it's frustrating when you are having classmates getting early offers at all these places, though (in my opinion)! What does your online status say? I know someone who just got an interview after their status said "Under Consideration" for like 6 weeks before they got a call (the whole different departments waiting longer thing).

The questions were more general for my digital interview. Not every set of questions are the same (from what I've compared with my friends' digital interviews). Mine questions were like: Why nursing? Why peds? Why CHOA? What 3 new grad areas are you interested in and why? What did you like/ learn from your practicum? Etc. Hope this helps!

Oh and I understand about going the efficient route. This is my second career and I'll turn 31 in July. Happy early birthday, by the way! It's never too late to pursue a new career that you know you'll love :-)

Just like GSU's ACE program, you have to have a previous degree for KSU's accelerated. They only take 40 people for the accelerated program each spring or fall semester. The traditional program takes 80 I believe. There are actually a couple of threads about both programs on the Georgia forum where people post their statistics. That would give you the best idea of where you stand (you have a really good GPA already). Accelerated is 4 semesters, summer included. Traditional is two years (5 semesters). If you start in the spring, you have your first summer off. If you go to the Wellstar School of Nursing's website, it gives you sample schedules for what semesters you start (you have to click on curriculum maybe? It's somewhere in there). I agree though about going for the BSN. As I've been applying for jobs, it seems that a lot of area hospitals prefer BSN on their job listings. It seems less costly in money and time to just get the BSN in the first place if that's your end goal. Good luck!!!

I currently attend KSU. But, when I was applying to schools, I was accepted to both KSU and GSU. The deciding factor to me was the fact that GSU requires 2 classes to qualify for their ACE program (this may have changed since I applied in the fall of 2012). These two classes were only offered at GSU and it means 2 extra classes that KSU didn't require (extra $$$). If you're already enrolled for prereqs at GSU, then it makes sense. But, I was not. From personal experience, I have had wonderful opportunities at KSU. My professors have been great. It is competitive to get in, but it is a state school (more affordable) with a great reputation and an education that does rival the area's private programs. It's worth it to apply to both! Hope this helps!

If you don't have prior experience as a PCT, then most hospitals require either completion of one semester of nursing school (one clinical rotation, more specifically) or CNA certification to be hired as a PCT. Reading posts on here can get super overwhelming when applying for nursing programs! I know I felt that way when I was applying! I was a second career student with a previous GPA

http://www.hhs.gov/ocr/privacy/hipaa/complaints/index.html Here is the link on how to report a violation, but this escalates it to a serious place. There is another option, too. Most facilities have a privacy officer or an entity that fills this role. That's their only job- to make sure that they are compliant with HIPAA. If it's a facility that's part of a chain, this person may be at their main office or main facility (hospital). They'll list them on their website, most likely. If it were me, I would go to that privacy officer (not an administrator or nurse manager or anyone at the responsible facility). They may reprimand the party responsible without someone having major career consequences. Suspension, administrative leave, transfer, etc. I'm just not sure of your situation and if this facility is a repeat offender, or if the post was harmful in nature.... But, if the person posted something where their heart was maybe in the right place, but made a mistake, taking it to the Dept. of Health and Human Services may have serious career consequences for that person. I'm definitely not giving you advice to go either way, but you have options. I would also consider talking to a lawyer, too.

SoldierNurse is absolutely right. Sharing rooms with a chemo patient is a bad idea if pregnant. In pharm, we learned a ton of prototype chemo drugs are pregnancy category X and a lot of them are excreted in bodily fluids. When nurses empty bed pans, gloves are required (even more than just regular bodily fluid prevautions). Gloves are required for opening some oral chemo meds too because they can cause birth defects if a pregnant woman is handling. Other precautions like closing lids on toilets when flushing are recommended because of aerosols, etc. It was my understanding from Pharm that most chemo patients have private rooms anyway. Someone may have said that too in an above post.

Congrats!!!! No summer school!